A Little More History

by Dr. James D. Long(From Biology Department Newsletter, 1991)

The last issue of the Department Newsletter contained a few notes on the early history of the Biology program at Sam Houston, citing I. R. Dean and Walter M. Coleman as the first to teach this subject on our campus. Mr. Coleman left Huntsville at the end of the 1907-08 school year and was replaced by Robert L. Marquis who taught here one academic year. His position was replaced in 1909 by Carl G. Hartman who remained on the faculty through 1911. Both of these men must have been exceptional people. They went from teaching at Sam Houston to accumulate very impressive records during their professional careers.

Robert Marquis was born in 1880 at Goliad, Texas. The fact that his middle name was Lincoln and that his birth was only fifteen years after the end of the Civil War suggests that his parents, Alexander and Ammo Webster Marquis, may not have been long-time Texas residents. He attended Add-Ran Christian College at Waco, Texas, receiving the A.B. degree in 1901. This school had been established in 1873 by J. A. Clark and his sons, Adderson and Randolph, at Thorp Springs in Hood County, Texas, and moved to Waco in 1895. In 1909, this college was moved again, this time to Fort Worth, Texas, and renamed Texas Christian University. Mr. Marquis later earned a B.S. degree from the University of Texas (1902) and the M.S. degree from the University of Chicago (1903).

Mr. Marquis' first teaching position was at the Add-Ran College where he taught "science" (1903-04). He held a similar position at John Tarleton College, Stephenville, Texas, from 1904 until employed as a biologist at Sam Houston (1908-09). On leaving Sam Houston, he enrolled in graduate studies at the University of Texas (there were no doctoral programs there at that time) and after a year, accepted a faculty post at West Texas Normal Institute in Canyon, Texas, remaining there until 19] 8. He next taught at North Texas Normal in Denton, Texas, leaving this position in 1920 to become the principal (i.e., president) at Sul Ross Normal in Alpine, Texas, the year this school was first organized. In 1923, at the time the Texas Legislature was changing the name of all Normal Institutes to State Teachers Colleges, Mr. Marquis became the "first" president of the newly renamed North Texas State Teachers College at Denton. He continued in his position until his death, April 15, 1934.

During his career, Mr. Marquis was very active in professional education organizations. He was a life member of both the Texas State Teachers and the National Educational Associations and served a term as President of the Southern Association of Secondary Schools and Colleges in 1929. In recognition of his professional accomplishments, Austin College at Sherman, Texas, awarded him an LL.D. in 1925. Dr. Marquis married Lulu Mae Parkey of Cumberland Gap, Tennessee, June 2, 1907, and was the father of twin sons, Robed and Richard.

Carl G. Hartman was the fourth biology teacher to grace these hallowed halls. He was born June 3, 1879, in Reinbeck, Iowa, the son of Ossian and Sophia Lemwigh Hartman. After attending the State University of Iowa briefly (1896-97), he completed requirements for the B.A. degree in 1902 and the M.A. degree in 1904 at the University of Texas, majoring in zoology. Before coming to Sam Houston, he was County Superintendent of Schools for Travis County, Texas, in Austin from 1904 until 1909. When he left Huntsville in 1911, he returned to the University of Texas to teach zoology and work on a Ph.D. program in embryology under J. T. Patterson. He completed his studies in 1915 and was awarded the first doctoral degree to be granted by that institution. He married Eva Rettenmeyer from Meriden, Connecticut, June 23, 1919. They became the parents of three sons, Carl Frederick, Philip Emil, and Paul Arthur and one daughter, Bertha Grace.

Dr. Hartman remained on the zoology faculty at the University of Texas for a number of years, helping to establish many of the research programs still in existence at the institution. He accepted a position in 1925 as Research Assistant in Embryology with the Carnegie Institute. In 1941, he became Professor of Zoology and Chairman of the Zoology and Physiology Department at the University of Illinois in Urbana, Illinois. Dr. Hartman left Illinois in 1947 to become Director of the Physiology Department at the Ortho Research Foundation in Raritan, New Jersey, where he remained until his retirement in 1958 at the age of seventy-nine. After his retirement, he retained an active interest in research, holding the titles of Emeritus Research Director at the Ortho Foundation and Research Consultant at the Margaret Sanger Research Bureau in New York City until his death in 1966.

Dr. Hartman's Ph.D. thesis dealt with studies of opossum embryology and most of his later research was concerned with topics of a similar nature. His work with the opossum is considered to be a classic in the field of animal development, serving as a model for similar studies for a number of years and earning him the unofficial title of Father of modern embryology. His many honors include his election as a Fellow, Wistar Institute (1917), the Squibb Award (1946), the Lasker Award (1949), the Barren Metal (1963), and the First Marshal Metal, British Society for the Study of Fertility (1965). He was elected a member of the National Academy of Science in the early 1920's and served as President of the Society of Zoology in 1948 and as Honorary Vice President of the Society for the Study of Sterility in 1959. In the international area, he was a delegate to the International Physiology Congress in Russia (1935) and to the Signer-Pilignac Colloquium at Paris, France (1937), and was elected an honorary member of the Brazil Society for the Study of Sterility.

In 1963, Dr. Hartman returned to Texas briefly to deliver the introductory address at the Conference on Delayed Implantation sponsored by Rice University as a part of its semi-centennial year celebration. He was recognized as the guest of honor at this conference for his many research accomplishments. There seems little doubt that he ranks first in prestige among those who have taught biology at Sam Houston.

DNA electrophoresis showing the inserts in eight different (Escherichia coli) clones. We are cloning promoters from Mycobacterium smegmatis which are active in stationary phase.

Primm Lab

The Steelcolor Shiner (Cyprinella whipplei) is a common minnow that consumes terrestrial and aquatic insects and is an important player in regulating nutrient dynamics in stream ecosystems.

Hargrave Lab

Habitat assessment and inventories of small mammal populations.

Thies Lab

Reconstructing the paleoenvironment of northwestern Botswana by comparing indigenous species with fossil material excavated from two cave systems.

Thies Lab

The orangethroat darter (Etheostoma spectabile) is a common darter that consumes benthic grazing invertebrates affecting a stream primary productivity and creating a trophic cascade within an aquatic ecosystem.

Hargrave Lab

A collaboration with Dr. Howard K. Reinert at the College of New Jersey to investigate habitat use of the Boa constrictor which has recently invaded the island of Aruba. Potential niche overlap could become a concern for the conservation of the endangered Aruba Island Ratttlesnake.

A gregarine (Nubenocephalus secundus) parasitizing the midgut epithelium of the blue-ringed dancer (Argia sedula). This is one of many new gregarine species described from an investigation for the biodiversity of these aquatic insect parasites.

T. Cook Lab

Parental feeding rates to nestlings are monitored at nests of Carolina Wrens as part of a study on parental investment strategies.

Neudorf Lab

A unicellular bi-flagellated alga (Chlamydomonas reinhardtii) is a model organism for studying the inctracellular signaling mechanisms that control movement of eukaryotic cilia and flagella.

Gaillard Lab

A genus of parasitic plants (Harveya) depends entirely on its hosts for water, minerals, and photosynthates. Such plants are of unique interest in molecular evolution and systematics.

Randle Lab

A fossil jaw of a gerbil lying outside of Gcwhihaba cave, Botswana. Gerbils are important indicators for paleoenvironmental reconstruction in the region.

Lewis Lab

A radio-tracked female Northern Cardinal as part of a study on extra-pair mating strategies.

Neudorf Lab

The white-tailed deer persists in historic home ranges despite encroaching development. Studies of urbanization influences fecundity, distribution, enzootic and epizootic disease, and parasites are of interest.

Turner Lab

Chromatophore is the photosynthetic apparatus of R. sphaeroides which allows this organism to harvest light energy.

By examining what causes variation in modern African rodents, like this gerbil, we can better understand how environments have changed where we find their fossil ancestors.

Lewis Lab

A population of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii cells exhibiting phototaxis, migration toward light. Some pharmacological agents inhibit phototaxis by inhibiting flagellar motility of the cells.

Gaillard Lab

Species-specific mange mite recorded for the first time in Texas from 6-year-old male white-tailed deer. Infection of the deer may be related to effects of crowding in rural/urban deer herds.

Turner Lab

The southern redbelly dace (Phoxinus erythrogaster) is a common stream minnow that consumes benthic algae, playing an important role in the regulation of periphyton biomass in small headwater streams.

Hargrave Lab

Male Northern Cardinals are banded and measured as part of a study of extra-pair mating behavior.

Neudorf Lab

We are investigating the reproductive timing and potential of the Boa constrictor which has recently invaded the island of Aruba and has become a concern for the conservation efforts of the endangered Aruba Island Rattlesnake.

Lutterschmidt Lab

Distribution, abundance, and reproduction of rural/urban deer herds are a growing concern in southeast Texas. Habitat impacts relative to human encroachment and high deer populations are being studied by Turner's lab.

Turner Lab

A large lineage of small moths (Gelechioidea) remains poorly known in the Nearctic, with only 30% of its species described. Modern morphological and molecular systematics are used with behavioral and ecological data to study and infer systematic relationships.

Bucheli Lab

A gregarine (Nubenocephalus secundus) parasitizing the intestine of the blue-ringed dancer (Argia sedula) by attaching to the epithelium with a long slender epimerite and a wide "suction cup"-like protomerite at its anterior.

T. Cook Lab

The reptile fauna from northwestern Botswana, including this chameleon, is helping us better understand how and why the climate has changed in this region over the last two million years.

Lewis Lab

This neotropical hemipteran (Neoplea absona) in the family Pleidae was a specimen used to revise the genus. Pleids, or pygmy backswimmers, are predators of micro-crustaceans in stagnant waters.